A place for all things bookish

Main menu

Post navigation

Top 10 Books I Loved as a Kid

Hello, hello! Today’s TTT is a Throwback Freebie, hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, and I’m “throwing back” to when I was a kid. I’ve got some of the books that I loved when I was in elementary/middle school. Maybe you’ll find some you enjoyed, and we can reminisce together!

1. Paint the Wind by Pam Munoz Ryan

This was my FAVORITE book for quite some time. Whenever anyone asked for a good book to read I would tell them to read this one. I would tell them to read it even if they didn’t ask for a recommendation. It’s about a girl who goes to a camp and rides horses, which is interesting considering I strongly dislike the outdoors… (Also the horse on the cover is pretty cool looking!)

2. The Leanin’ Dog by K.A. Nuzum

Another animal book… I really liked those as a kid. I’m not much of an animal person now, but you never know. Anyways, this book was interesting because a girl and her dad live in a cabin in the woods, but the girl is afraid to leave the house. A dog finds its way to them, and she keeps it inside as her friend. That’s all I can remember, but I really liked it!!

3. The City of Ember by Jeanne DuPrau

This was probably one of the first fantasy/sci-fi/dystopian books that I ever read. I really liked the idea of a society that lived underground, and their efforts to escape were rather intriguing. I never read the rest of the series, though, so maybe I can do that one day. (I recently discovered there is a movie adaptation on one of my visits to the library. I’m excited to watch it!)

4. Dork Diaries by Rachel Renee Russell

This is basically Diary of a Wimpy Kid (which I also really liked) for girls, if you are unfamiliar. I could breeze through these books, and they were pretty entertaining! It’s formatted like a journal, which was fun, especially if I was in need of a quick read.

5. The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick

This book is awesome mainly because of its formatting. The story is told alternately in chapters of drawings and regular writing. The drawings are AMAZING!! I totally wish I could draw like that! It also made the book a fast read, plus the story is interesting. (Also, there’s a movie, which was actually pretty good, too!)

6. American Girl books

Ok, I loved American Girl stuff when I was 9, 10 ish, and I read several sets of their books. For those who are unfamiliar, the American girl dolls have corresponding sets of books including events set in the doll’s time period. The very first set that I read was Kirsten, so she became my favorite. I also read Addy and Julie, which were good, too!

7. TheLemonade War by Jaqueline Davies

For some unknown reason, I LOVED this book. (I found there are more, and I was a bit excited, though they are waaayy below my reading level…) It had some sibling love, and lemonade, so what’s better than that?

8. Junie B. Jones by Barbara Park

I don’t know of a girl who didn’t read these as a kid. Junie B. Jones was hilarious and did some pretty stupid things, but it made for great entertainment! My favorite one was when she got stuck in the school at night. Like, that’s not even possible (?) but I loved it!

9. Where the Sidewalk Ends by Shel Silverstein

Poems!! My grandma had this book at her house, and she would always read a poem or two out of it before we went to bed when we stayed with her. We got to choose, of course, and I always picked the one about a guy losing his head, but he was actually sitting on it, but he was unaware, since his head was not attached to his body… (a bit strange if you think about it…)

10. One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish by Dr. Seuss

This one is probably my favorite Dr. Seuss book, or Green Eggs and Ham. Both of them could be found at my grandma’s house as well, and we would read them nearly every time we visited her. About a year ago, I pulled one out to see how fast I could read it now, which was rather entertaining!

What books did you enjoy as a kid? Did you want ones you could read really fast? What about animal books? Link me to your TTT!

Yes I was all into American Girl books too! Which is hilarious since I’m…Australian.😂 But my sister and I collected TONS and we loved Addy, Kit and Samantha a lot. Oh and Josephine! They were pretty awesome back then haha. (Did you ever go for the paperdolls? We did, but not the actual dolls because ouch to the expense.😂) Also I LOVE City of Ember! I didn’t read it as a kid but I did watch the movie back then and loved it. 😀

Haha that’s interesting! I mean, American Girl is just a brand right? So anyone can read them! I forgot about Kit! I really liked her movie as well. I don’t remember having paper dolls, but I had an actual one, and my sister and I loved to play with them! I will have to check out the City of Ember movie because now I’m really excited about it!! 😄